‘[God said:] This is my Son, whom I love. Listen to him!’ - Mark 9:7
Brothers and sisters, last week as we dived into Lent we were challenged by our readings to make this the best Lent ever; not by doing loads of Lenten disciplines but by learning to trust God more and more. This week we pick up that theme of trust by being challenged to take the next step of being obedient even when we don’t understand why. Let me tell you about a guy called Andy. Andy was born in the Netherlands just before the Second World War. As a young boy Andy always wanted adventures and when the Nazis invaded he joined the resistance. It was certainly an adventure but it was also horrible; all of the things he had to see, all the things he had to do as a resistance fighter led him to become quite hard to life, led him to become cynical. Anyway, Andy got shot in the ankle and was taken to a Christian hospital. Andy wasn’t a believer but he was struck by the cheerfulness of the nuns who were taking care of him. One day he asked them what on earth made them so cheerful with everything that is going on around them. The answer the nuns gave was: ‘What makes us cheerful is the love of Jesus, it’s all contained in that book, that bible, sat by your bed.’ So Andy picked up the Bible and in reading it he encountered Jesus and became a Christian. Andy learnt that he needed to trust God by learning to be obedient even when we don’t understand why.
Now lots of us I think—like Andy—that we quite fancy the idea of adventure. Certainly the adverts think we do they are always suggesting that buying their product will take us on a great adventure and adverts that offer adventure sell more products. Natalie and I have started to watch the Lord of the Rings films extended edition let me tell they are long! After 45 minutes Frodo and Sam still haven’t left the Shire; if you know the books or the films you’ll know that this is only the introduction, most of the film is about the adventure they take after leaving the shire. The point of me telling you this is that those first 45 mins is all about getting to know Frodo the Hobbit who wants to go on an adventure. I think most of us are like Frodo. We like the idea of going on an adventure but truth be told adventures are scary and uncertain, when we find ourselves in the middle of one we find ourselves feeling unsafe, anxious, and wanting just to go home. After all, an adventure can be summed up as not knowing what will happen next, and all of us want to know what happens next. Uncertainty equals fear and all of us hate fear. We want certainty, we want to know what will happen next. We like to be comfortable and the only way we’ll be comfortable is if we understand the process, if we understand the next step, and crucially where it leads. As long as I know I’ll go. As long as I know how, and crucially, as long as I know why. Not long into the Lord of the Rings Frodo just wants to go home, he’s had enough of adventures! For most of us this is our approach to God: ‘God, explain to me the next step, explain to me why I must take it, and then and only then will I move forward!’ However, you know what that leaves out? It leaves out trust in God, it leaves out faith in God; instead it puts trust in ourselves, it puts trust in the process, and as a result, our faith in God never grows. Now don’y get me wrong ‘why’ can be a great question, Amelie (my 4 year old) often asks ‘why’ and by asking that question she is learning a lot; but what happens when asking ‘why’ gets in the way? What happens when asking ‘why’ stops us moving forward? What we see in our Old Testament story (Genesis 22) today is that trust led to obedience and obedience came before understanding.
The true story from Genesis is famous and indeed we studied it in full a couple of years ago; if you want to understand it better go to our website click on ‘News’ and scroll down until you find Genesis 22. Today, I just want to focus on one thing: the trust and obedience of Abraham. Now many times in his life Abraham had heard God’s voice, and over the course of his life—from Genesis 12 to Genesis 22—God had been showing Abraham that he could trust Him. Now comes the greatest test of all. We’re told: ‘Some time later God tested Abraham. He said to him, ‘Abraham!’‘Here I am,’ he replied. Then God said, ‘Take your son, your only son, whom you love—Isaac—and go to the region of Moriah. Sacrifice him there as a burnt offering’. Ouch, what a command! We know this story so we’re not going to dwell on it, just notice one thing: there is no ‘why’. God doesn’t give Abraham a reason, He just says ‘Go’. Abraham’s life, Abraham’s adventures with God, have led him to this point, they’ve led him to a place where he can trust God and act in obedience even when he doesn’t understand ‘why’. Abraham trusts God, he steps out in obedience, and only later does he come to see the full picture that Isaac was never in danger, God would always take care of him. Abraham had learned the crucial step that trust in God leads us to obedience even when we don’t understand why. Our next step in learning to trust God this Lent, is that we're to trust God even when we don’t understand the process; in fact we’re only truly trusting God when we get to that point. If we understood beforehand, if we knew how it would work out we wouldn’t have trust, wouldn’t have faith, in fact, if we knew how it was going to work out beforehand we wouldn’t need God. ‘Why’ is a good question but when it becomes an obstacle to actually acting then we need to ask a better question, we need ask ‘how’. Not ‘why God should I do this?’ but ‘how God should I do this?’ We see this in our Gospel reading (Mark 9:2-10).
Another famous story, ‘The Transfiguration’. Jesus becomes whiter than white. He is seen talking with the Old Testament prophets—Moses and Elijah—and Peter, not knowing what to say, starts babbling about camping. Notice, Peter gets a bit of a divine telling-off and a lesson all in one go: ’a voice came from the cloud: ‘This is my Son, whom I love. Listen to him!’. It’s almost ‘Stop babbling Peter and do what you’re told; trust Jesus and do what He says’. And what does Jesus say immediately after this command? 'Jesus gave them orders not to tell anyone what they had seen’. Do you know what? Peter, James, and John did it, they listened to Jesus and they obeyed. Jesus didn’t tell them why, they just trusted Him and acted in obedience. Peter had learned something in his time with Jesus: to trust the voice, to trust Jesus when He speaks, even when He doesn’t tell Peter ‘why’.
Back to Dutch Andy who I introduced at the beginning of the sermon. That he had come to know Jesus and now needed to learn to listen and act even when he didn’t know why? Well not long after his conversion he felt that God was calling him to write articles for a local magazine. It was strange because what Andy really needed was money so that he could go and be a missionary, but the articles he was meant to write he wouldn’t get paid for. However, Andy acted, he obeyed God and he wrote the articles, and money started to come in. Then the leader of Andy’s Christian community came to him one day and said ‘Andy, I was praying the other day and it was very clear, God wants you to learn to drive. Now, this was weird. In Holland everywhere is flat, most people take the bus, or have a bike, and remember Andy has no money. Anyway after repeated attempts by his friend Andy eventually agrees to learn to drive, he takes his test and he passes. The next thing he knows Andy is called to take bibles to the other side of the Iron Curtain—to cross into the Soviet Union who had taken over half of Europe after the Second World War. Because of his articles he can afford to but the bibles and then someone offers to give him a car—a Volkswagen Beetle—and the rest, as they say is history. Andy ends up taking millions of bibles into Communist—controlled Europe bringing hope and light to many through years of difficult times. Andy sets up an organisation, ‘Open Doors,’ which to this day gets bibles into places where Christianity is illegal.
Andy always wanted to go on an adventure but it was only when he learned to trust God, it was only when he learned that obedience comes before understanding, that God could use him on one of the most amazing adventures of all. This Lent God is calling on us to learn this lesson, to trust the Person who is speaking, to trust Him even when we don’t understand why. To learn that obedience comes before understanding, and that only through faith in God will we be able to go on this adventure of obedience. It may not take us on such a big adventure as it did for Andy, but responding positively and saying ‘yes’ to the seemingly small things God asks us to do in our lives will help our trust in God to truly grow throughout this Lent and beyond. Amen (from Fr Mike).